***
This time, among the 24 Mo Nan leaders recruited by Ma Yongzhen, more than half of the troops from each tribe participated in the war. Ma Yongzhen planned carefully and finally found a plausible reason to completely control these troops.
As soon as the matter was agreed upon, he immediately disbanded the 24 troops and reorganized them into a new army.
Except for one or two Mongolian leaders such as Tengjil who were "determined to suppress the bandits", most of the reorganized army was commanded by Qin army generals at each level.
The leaders of each tribe were actually sidelined and became mere supporting roles in the army.
Although they had some doubts in their hearts, no one wanted to be the first to offend Ma Yongzhen. Who knows how he would be punished.
Besides, it's not just your own unit that has handed over its troops, there are 24 units in total, and it's the same for everyone. If there are any problems, it's not just your responsibility.
Ma Yongzhen even guaranteed in the name of the Great Qin Emperor that after successfully suppressing Norbu, all the captured Great Qin would not be kept, but would be given to the various tribes. At that time, they would be divided according to the number of troops sent by each tribe.
After hearing this guarantee, the leaders of each department were all beaming with joy.
Norbu had just annexed the Tushetu in the northern desert and the Tumed left and right wing banners in the southern desert. Together with Norbu's own tribe, how many cattle and sheep would he have
They originally thought that the Qin Dynasty would definitely take the lion's share, but now it all belongs to us.
It’s exciting just to think about it.
This promise is not a lie. Daqin does not look down on those cattle and sheep. It's just that for Daqin, what's yours is mine, and what's mine is still mine.
In a word, you are the people of Daqin. Where else can your cattle and sheep run to
Ma Yongzhen spent a full five days thoroughly reorganizing the troops participating in the war. Then he divided the 40,000-strong army into two groups. One group, commanded by Guo Yunlong, marched towards the cities of Bansheng and Guihua.
At this time, Qin Mu of Xijing also rejected all the opinions and temporarily gave up sending more troops to suppress Qita Te in Hetao, and only allowed Su Jin's 10,000 troops to attack if they could, and to defend if they could not.
Let Qitate first dig hard in the Feng Shui treasure land of Helan Mountain, and then he will do it after he has dug his own tomb deep enough.
Qin Mu's plan did not change because of Qitate's wandering around Hetao, and he continued to make annihilating Gushi Khan's tens of thousands of troops his primary goal. The 40,000 troops led by Gao Yigong and others had already arrived in Qinzhou (Tianshui).
Gushri Khan Turubaihu is not an easy person to deal with, and it is not easy to trap him.
In order to avoid alerting the enemy, and also considering that the army had traveled thousands of miles from Nanjing and was indeed exhausted, Qin Mu ordered Gao Yigong and his men to rest in Qinzhou temporarily to recuperate and recuperate.
In this way, Lintao, Taozhou and Hezhou in Longyou may be very dangerous, but as the saying goes, you can't catch a wolf without sacrificing the lamb.
At that time, in order to gain strategic initiative, Taizu was willing to give up even his old nest in Yan'an.
Give up, give up, only by giving up can you gain. This is absolutely a wise saying.
Whether Gushih Khan can be completely annihilated is related to the long-term stability of Hexi, Longyou, and western Sichuan, and whether we can seize the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. It can even be said that it is related to whether the Qin Dynasty can win a hundred years of peace. This battle can only succeed, not fail.
In order to encourage the soldiers, Qinzhou decided to lead the army himself.
His reputation as an emperor was irreplaceable in the Qin army, and even if he did not personally command the battle, as long as he approached the front line, it would be a great encouragement to the Qin army.
***
The seven stars of the Big Dipper are high. Geshu carries a sword at night.
Until now, I have watched the herding horses, but I dare not go to Lintao.
In the Tang Dynasty, a man named Xibi wrote such an impassioned poem to praise Geshu Han, who was guarding Longyou at that time and had made great military achievements.
Lintao Prefecture, with its capital in Didao City, is an important town in Longyou, the southern gate of Lanzhou, and a key route on the ancient Silk Road.
During the Tang Dynasty, Longyou Road was the front line to resist the Tubo army. After the Song Dynasty, Tubo was like a loose sand, and the threat to the Central Plains dynasty gradually decreased.
But now, with Gushri Khan taking control of Qinghai-Tibet and basically unifying the various Tibetan tribes, a huge threat to the stability of Longyou has once again emerged.
Gushri Khan Turubaihu led his troops to besiege Lanzhou and sent his general Narisongnan to attack Lintao.
Narisong originally had only 7,000 troops. After Gushri Khan listened to the strategy of his adviser Sude, he sent another 10,000 troops to reinforce him.
At this moment, outside the city of Didao, the Hu horses were neighing in the wind, the battle flags were like clouds, and the murderous aura was overwhelming.
Wu Qingfeng, the Qin army commander guarding Ditao Prefecture, had only 2,000 soldiers and horses. After several days of fierce fighting, he suffered more than 500 casualties, and there were only 1,500 soldiers left in the city who could fight.
In order to protect the city of Didao, Lintao prefect Sheng Huaide and co-prefect Li Bocun organized the young and strong men in the city to repair the city walls and transport weapons despite the arrows and stones. When the war was critical, they would go up to the city to fight together.
The bombs, bullets and artillery shells stored in the city were almost used up, so the two organized the craftsmen in the city to sell their belongings and rush to make weapons.
On the top of the north gate, the defending general Wu Qingfeng was wearing a bloodstained military uniform. He had not been down the city wall for many days. His face was untidy with stubble and his eyes were bloodshot. He was holding a monocular telescope and observing the enemy camp outside the city.
The city walls were covered with traces of explosions and bloodstains. Under the city walls, bodies that had not yet been buried were scattered all over the place. The air was filled with thick smoke mixed with the smell of blood. On the bare yellow earth, arrows were scattered like thorns, filling the ground.
The personal soldier Wu Changting had just bandaged the arrow wound on his left arm, and bright red blood was still seeping out, staining the bandage a glaring scarlet.
He licked his cracked lips and asked, "General, when will the reinforcements arrive? We have sent messengers several times to ask for help, but it's been almost a month and there is still no sign of reinforcements. Does the court no longer care about us?"
"Shut up!" Wang Qingfeng was afraid that his nonsense would disrupt the morale of the army, so he immediately scolded him, "Lintao is an important town in Longyou and the southern gate of Lanzhou. How could the court ignore it? If you continue to talk nonsense, don't blame me for being ruthless in military law."
"General, I... Actually, it's not me who wants to ask this. The brothers are discussing this privately. They asked me to ask you, General."
Wu Qingfeng frowned secretly. It was not surprising that the soldiers had some doubts, but he didn't know how to explain it.
Lintao was strategically located at a very important position. Once it was lost, the southern gate connecting Lanzhou to Xijing would be blocked by the enemy.
Normally, for such an important city, the imperial court should have sent reinforcements, no matter how slow.
Half a month ago, he heard that Qin Zuoming led a thousand troops equipped with the most advanced Type 68 rifles and a number of rockets to Qinzhou. However, half a month later, Qin Zuoming's thousand troops disappeared, as if they had disappeared out of thin air.
Wu Qingfeng himself also wanted to find someone to ask what was going on.
"General, the enemy is attacking again!"
Deputy General Song Baitao suddenly shouted, and the atmosphere on the city wall suddenly became tense. The soldiers who were sitting under the battlements to rest jumped up and prepared for battle.
Wu Qingfeng quickly raised his telescope and looked towards the north of the city. He saw hundreds of enemies, pushing dozens of crossbows. Seeing this, Wu Qingfeng shouted: "Quick! Except for the lookout, everyone else should retreat to the city immediately, quick!"
The Mongols were different from other nomadic tribes. They were very good at learning. It is said that they used the artillery technology they learned during the Western Expedition to capture the Southern Song Dynasty's Xiangyang City in one fell swoop, which eventually led to the demise of the Southern Song Dynasty.
Now they filled the caltrops with explosives, ranging from five to ten pounds, and threw them onto the city with crossbows. The explosion was earth-shaking and had incredible lethality.
There were only six artillery pieces in Didao City, and the city walls were too narrow to place artillery pieces everywhere. The enemy's crossbows were easy to move and could always find blind spots for the artillery pieces on the city walls to attack.
Wu Qingfeng and his men had just retreated to the soldier hiding cave under the city when caltrops with sparks flying outside the city were thrown into the sky, whistling and hitting the top of the city wall, while most of them fell inside the city.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The huge explosions made people's ears hurt. Fireballs rose up in the city. The houses hit by the explosions collapsed with a crash. Rocks flew everywhere and the air was filled with smoke.
The soldier hiding cave was shaking violently, with dust falling down, as if it might collapse at any time.
All the Qin soldiers covered their ears and squatted in the hiding cave. Although they were not injured, the enemy's bombing was a huge blow to their morale.
The huge explosion lasted for three to five minutes, and the top of the city and the inside of the city were blown into a mess. At this time, the explosion stopped, and then the sound of a horn was heard outside the city, and the lookouts left on the top of the city also struck a bang of gongs at the same time.
"The enemy is attacking, quickly climb the city wall! Quickly climb the city wall!"
When the Qin army generals at all levels heard the gong sound, they immediately shouted loudly. One by one, the Qin soldiers rushed out of the hiding cave with weapons in hand and ran quickly to the top of the city along the horse path.
Looking outside the city through the thick smoke, I saw the enemy approaching the city wall like a dark cloud, and the shouts were like waves crashing against the shore:
Ah la!
Ah la!
... ... ... ... ..(To be continued...)
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